Thursday, April 4, 2013

- More time and experiences with Brenda. The weather changed (for the better), and Brenda and I have started taking short walks last week. It's still difficult sometimes time-wise to fit everything in during the day/week, but when we do get the schedules to work out, it's great. Just last night, I took Brenda to a performance of Shen Yun 2013 (I got us tickets as a Christmas present last year), and we had a great time. (I'm also working at creating some new experiences for "just me" as well, and that's going well. I've been working with a local film company, and learning a lot about various sides of the film industry I knew nothing about; I'm exploring and getting better acquainted with Portland-area businesses I've always meant to get to knew better;etc.)

- Write, write, write. I've got two short stories in various stages of completion. I'm fairly happy with how they are now (they're both in their final edits), and I look forward to setting them aside, calling them "done," and moving on to the next piece of fiction (and a piece of non-).

- Publish. Plans are still afoot, and I'm REALLY hoping to have something non-fiction ready to roll by the end of May.

- Stop doing things that feel like "a job" when it's not my job. I'm on top of this.

- Slimming down. Last month, I fell. Twice. And I'm ashamed to say that I let that be an excuse as to why I stopped getting on the treadmill. I've got degenerative disc disease, and I aggravated my back when I fell. While it was a valid excuse to take it easy, I haven't necessarily made getting back on the treadmill a priority. This morning, I stepped on it for the first time in over a month, and I plan to make that machine part of my morning routine again.

- Slimming down our home. I put three items on eBay. Does that count?

- Sorting comics. Nothin'.

- Continue consuming and promoting media outside of my comfort zone. As I type this, I'm listening to a podcast devoted to film music. Accompanying it on my iPod are podcasts about Oregon history, writing, the Indiana Jones franchise, horror movies, and self-motivation. Movie-wise, I've watched more classic genre cinema as of late than anything else, and book-wise, I'm currently reading Sean Howe's Marvel Comics: The Untold Story and Stephen D. Sullivan's Blue Kingdoms: Zombies, Werewolves, & Unicorns. I don't know if I'm completely out of my comfort zone right now or not, but I do enjoy what media I'm consuming.

- Cut back on mindless media consumption. I'm still doing good here. I don't finish movies that bore me. I make very good use of Amazon's ability to allow me to sample a few pages of a book before buying it for my Kindle.

- Consolidate/organize my media. I just started the process of pulling movies out of my DVD collection I no longer need/want.

- Finances. Not so good. That's all I want to say about that right now.

- Podcasting. As we announced in last week's episode of Mail Order Zombie, we're bringing that podcast to an end by the end of the month. I'm still going to produce 1951 Down Place, and I've got something else in the works. Stay tuned!